Power cords -- is there a difference?

[Jax]

BTW, some responses along this thread have audiophile grade power cable (which is a marketing scam) confused with what I was referring to, which is how electrons move in a power cable. If you want to spend about 40x the price for audiophile power cable by all means go right ahead, but you could simply go to home depot a pick up some 10 or 12 gauge power cable and build your own connectors. I'm not an electrician like sonicdogg, just sharing what I've learned. I don't want to get into the techincal reasons, but if you make the power cable from your power supply to your amp or active monitors into a path of least resistance, your amps and thus your monitors don't have to work as hard reproducing sound and they would through a more restricted path. This actually falls right into line with the way things work in the known world: in nature, all things take the path of least resistance. Go figure.

Anyway, try it for yourself. If you're not much for soldering, just buy some premade 10 or 12 gauge power cables and use those for your amps or active monitors. They can be hard to find but well worth it.

If I have time, I'll post some of the references I learned this from if anyone's interested.

[alphajerk]

is it only supposed to be 110? i measured my outlets running 118.

[Jax]

Told ya I wasn't an electrician. I may have learned some stuff but pushed the simpler junk out in the process. Only so much room up there. 120 sounds right but I've seen it referred to as 110 for whatever confusing goddamned reason. I know my Furman splits it into two legs of 60 so it has to be 120....

I would have slapped myself upside the head eventually.

[sonic dogg]

....so...110 vs. 120 voltage wise....this is, for intents and purposes here, simply a rating that maufacturers came up with to rate their equipments requirements.....110 is a slighty older term than 120....in actuality the voltage you have available at your outlets will vary by as much as 10volts in the us and more elsewhere...ya dont see those english guys on here talking about their 120 volt stuff cause it aint....they're at 200 volts(i think thats right)...your local power company generates the power for your area and is also instrumental in determining how it will be distributed to each user and in what voltage....in some parts of the country they use 240 volt 3phase transformers at the poles for light commercial and residential power...very seldom 3 phase at a residence but for the most part a 240volt main tranny is in use...half of a single phase 240 volt is 120....a lot of the country now uses(especially out west) 208 volt power....but half is not 110 or 120...but through the windings of the main transformer it is generally 118 volts depending on how close you are to a sub-station, how much industry is close by,are there large buildings with huge amounts of flourescent and other electrical discharge lighting...all these variables are the simple reason to use power conditioning in a studio....you know you can now buy light bulbs rated @130 volts? they last much longer! thanx class for being so attentive ...now wheres my ****n cookies?

[Jax]

Will you accept a fax of some cookies?

Where can I get 130 volt light bulbs, home depot? And do they make 'em halogen?

My track lighting halogen bulbs don't last for shit.

[sonic dogg]

Fax cookies are o-k as long as they werent in the bag with that cat...............i have seen 130v rated halogens....more money btw....the problem you might be having is the track itself....little spring tabs that just touch a rail....not that good of a connection....slightly unsecure track mounting....a bit of movement and the connection gets a bit dicey...also the track heads(fixtures) usually hang....so theyre a bit unbalanced and any slight jiggle can decrease the bulb life....some track is suspended....i dont want this to sound lik i dont like tracklights...i love em...i just make sure they're really solidly mounted...could be the reason for short lived lamps..........peece

[Mike Jasper]

Jax -- What kind of Furman unit are you using?

I'm definitely interested in this aspect of the rig. And I'm surprised to hear that computers do not benefit from balanced power. Figures, the one place I can use a line regulator without having the hum leak through.

Again, my studio is small, pretty much a big vocal booth, so even the slightest hum is detrimental. I did hear back from Equitech and the guy said it doesn't make the slightest noise in his rig, but that it varies from studio to studio. Sure wish there was a dealer in Austin so I could try some of these different power supplies out.

Jasper

[Jax]

I'm using the IT1210. Cheapest price I found was about $675 from pacific pro audio. Many places are charging closer to $1k. BTW, it's not a line regulator, it's balanced power. I'd say check out the Furman website, but I just tried to and it's bascially non-functioning.

[Steve Smith]

Originally posted by Mike Jasper
Jax -- What kind of Furman unit are you using?

I'm definitely interested in this aspect of the rig. And I'm surprised to hear that computers do not benefit from balanced power. Figures, the one place I can use a line regulator without having the hum leak through.

Again, my studio is small, pretty much a big vocal booth, so even the slightest hum is detrimental. I did hear back from Equitech and the guy said it doesn't make the slightest noise in his rig, but that it varies from studio to studio. Sure wish there was a dealer in Austin so I could try some of these different power supplies out.

Jasper

Computers do benefit from balanced power. It apparently reduces errors or something.. ( I would be talking out my ass if I tried to explain this) That is why they use bal AC in hospitals for critical equipment.

I have the 2 rack space Equitech 20 amp unit sitting about 4 feet from my head in the studio, and it makes NO ( read: zero) noise at all, and I bought it from a dealer near austin, tx : Al Priest @
Studio Tech Supply

Good Luck, Al is a great guy, give him a call!

[Mike Jasper]

Yeah, I heard from Rick at Equitech today and he told me Al Priest carried them. I'm going to meet with Al after the holidays, so it'll be on my list to check out.

Zero noise is a good thing.

Jasper

[Jax]

Originally posted by Steve Smith
Computers do benefit from balanced power. It apparently reduces errors or something.. ( I would be talking out my ass if I tried to explain this) That is why they use bal AC in hospitals for critical equipment.

Balanced power might reduce errors, but not noise in any audio cards/components you have installed in your computer. On those devices you would have a slight increase in noise floor. Time to dig this up so I know I'm not talking out my ass. Back sooner or later with my sources.

[Steve Smith]

On a side note, you will liely not have any interaction between the bal power and your cpu, as you cannot plug a UPS into balanced power ( it sees it as a fault) so unless you buy an extra little unit to plug into your UPS output your computer will not even see the bal power.

Jax, I would be interested to read that, I am not disputing you, I just like to learn...

[Jax]

The best I can do is direct you to the mastering webboard. No this isn't the one at psw, it's the real deal. You'd have to register and get a password (it's very much worth doing just for that, amazing resource), but here's the link. The information is spread over many posts, so it would be hard to compile here.

When you get in, do a search for "balanced power". There's a long thread with some very insightful and technical posts from Bob Katz, Dave Collins, Glenn Meadows, and Juergen Hanelt among others. I don't want to ask each of them if I can quote them, it would take too long. All of them of very well known, respected mastering engineers who I would consider experts. I have no reason to think their knowledge is less than empirical on this subject. Be right back with the link.

[Jax]

Here's the link:

mastering webboard

the site isn't much fun to navigate, but when you search for "balanced power", click any of the topics that read "Re: balanced power" then click "show entire topic" within the first message that comes up.

Tedious site but worth it.

[subspace]

Originally posted by Mike Jasper

I'm definitely interested in this aspect of the rig. And I'm surprised to hear that computers do not benefit from balanced power. Figures, the one place I can use a line regulator without having the hum leak through.

Again, my studio is small, pretty much a big vocal booth, so even the slightest hum is detrimental. I did hear back from Equitech and the guy said it doesn't make the slightest noise in his rig, but that it varies from studio to studio. Sure wish there was a dealer in Austin so I could try some of these different power supplies out.

So there are no other rooms nearby that you could put the unit in? I move anything I don't need to access frequently into a small closet in the hall, with a cable run through the wall. Keeps the heat down in the room and some of the larger power transformers (power amps, console supply, etc.) away from audio lines. A few heavy outlet extenders isn't going to hurt the performance of the supply. I imagine Equitech's wall box systems are designed to be used just this way.
I keep all the audio gear on one circuit, while all the computers/ monitors/ switching supply stuff is plugged into a UPS on a second circuit, with the lighting. I didn't realize the Furman unit was that affordable, so this thread has got me thinking about adding one to my audio circuit. I understand they can really clean up guitar amps as well (the noisiest thing in my tracks.)

[Mike Jasper]

I've got a very small space here, and I'm lucky to have that. But I do separate the power supplies as you described. If the rack mount Equitech is as quiet as they say, it should work out.



Jasper

[Jax]

A 3 foot radius around your balanced power with nothing audio sensitive in it is fine. Otherwise, you start adding electromagnetic interference into any susceptible audio paths. Balanced paths won't suffer much ill effect as long as they are also well shielded, but no reason to tempt the gremlins if you can avoid them.

My Furman sits on the floor underneath my console, and it's 3 feet away from the nearest rack of mic pres. Mike I would save some money and buy the Furman. I seriously doubt there is anything to gain from using the Equitech, especially for a unit where mechanical noise filtering is an "option". The Furman is alot quieter than you might think it is.

[faeflora]

I never heard the mechanical noise filtering was an option. I thought that the "filter" option was to optimize current for digital devices.